Go to page

Death Prophet

THIS IS ONLY ABOUT AMAZON U.S. I've been thinking about making a thread like this for a while because it's something I find interesting, but I didn't want to sound sensationalist or jump to conclusions, but I kind of feel like that is no longer the case anymore.

Okay, so last July (yes more than a year ago) Amazon put the 3DS "under review". This means that they stopped selling it for some unspecified reason. I made a thread about it here. A lot of people were saying it was some kind of error or that they were temporarily out of stock and at shortly after it seemed like that could be right because Amazon started selling 3DS handhelds once more. But some people brought up the screen scratching issue that the 3DS has (look here for more information on that). User TheBez even quoted an Amazon stating the reason it was under review was for a somewhat similar but different reason.

Talked with an Amazon rep and this is what he said:
The reason why this is under a review :
The flip-screen is loose when its opened, please inform them that Nintendo has confirmed as long as the upper screen locks into place, the unit is within Nintendo&#8217;s design specification. Customers can call 1-800-255-3700

And this is still where we are at. Amazon is not selling any Wii, DS, or 3DS SKUs. Amazon will sell the games, but the systems are all sold by 3rd party sellers. And yes, to clear up some confusion, although you can buy the systems from the Amazon website, Amazon doesn't sell them directly. Notice the prices on nearly all 3DS models are about 10-15 dollars higher than they should be. And, while Amazon has a page for the 3DS XL (here), you can't preorder it from them and the system comes out in less than a month so I think they would be on that by now.

I just have to wonder if Amazon will sell the Wii U. I would think that they wouldn't turn their back on a new major console, but they did on a potential hot selling redesign of a handheld.
I feel like some people are going to respond that these systems are out of stock or something, but they are simply not. It's been like this for months as shown in that thread. There has been discussion about this in other topics, but I can't find them at the moment.
Maybe this is just completely stupid but I've been kind of scratching my head at this for many months now. Again, not to sensationalize it, but it seems like there is something amiss in the relationship between Nintendo and Amazon.

Banned

All signs point to Nintendo being dicks. There's absolutely no reason why Amazon would willingly choose to not stock Nintendo hardware outside of the faulty 3DSes. Most likely Nintendo punishing them for speaking up about Nintendo's own screen scratching fiasco. The only hardware Amazon still has is old stock of the Limited Edition Pokemon Black DSi Bundle.

Member

All signs point to Nintendo being dicks. There's absolutely no reason why Amazon would willingly choose to not stock Nintendo hardware outside of the faulty 3DSes. Most likely Nintendo punishing them for speaking up about Nintendo's own screen scratching fiasco. The only hardware Amazon still has is old stock of the Limited Edition Pokemon Black DSi Bundle.

Member

I hope that we get a direct answer to this issue some day; I do believe either Amazon, Nintendo of America, or both share some of the blame; hardly doubt this is a coincidence or just Nintendo systems selling so well that they're never in stock.

For what it's worth, Amazon put up their Wii U 'Notify Me When Available' page quite a while ago, before E3, and the page actually has a ton of info on the system (unlike the barebones 3DS XL pages). I'm really hoping to be able to purchase the Wii U from them; if not, then I guess Best Buy will do, like I pre-ordered my 3DS XL from them.

Member

It should also be mentioned that last year when Amazon.com stopped selling Nintendo hardware they also put up a chart called Handheld Console Choices on the Nintendo product pages directly comparing the tech specs of Nintendo handhelds to Sony handhelds, that chart is not present on any of the Sony product pages, just the Nintendo ones.

Member

It should also be mentioned that last year when Amazon.com stopped selling Nintendo hardware they also put up a chart called Handheld Console Choices on the Nintendo product pages directly comparing the tech specs of Nintendo handhelds to Sony handhelds, that chart is not present on any of the Sony product pages, just the Nintendo ones.

Member

It should also be mentioned that last year when Amazon.com stopped selling Nintendo hardware they also put up a chart called Handheld Console Choices on the Nintendo product pages directly comparing the tech specs of Nintendo handhelds to Sony handhelds, that chart is not present on any of the Sony product pages, just the Nintendo ones.

Death Prophet

It should also be mentioned that last year when Amazon.com stopped selling Nintendo hardware they also put up a chart called Handheld Console Choices on the Nintendo product pages directly comparing the tech specs of Nintendo handhelds to Sony handhelds, that chart is not present on any of the Sony product pages, just the Nintendo ones.

Banned

It should also be mentioned that last year when Amazon.com stopped selling Nintendo hardware they also put up a chart called Handheld Console Choices on the Nintendo product pages directly comparing the tech specs of Nintendo handhelds to Sony handhelds, that chart is not present on any of the Sony product pages, just the Nintendo ones.

Member

Was thinking the same thing hope Amazon sells the Wii U. I sent a inquiry recently about the 3ds XL and the response i got was very generic saying to keep watch the site it maybe sold out. It made no sense customer service was messing with me.

Member

Because they don't know the prices yet. Rather than notify people of a price increase and dealing with having to honor the lower price/getting a lot of cancels, they just bring down the price accordingly. In other words, it's easier to subtract than it is to add.

No where is tax free. Without a doubt Amazon and other major online retailers provide an entire order history of what people purchase through their site to the government so they know what's up and who isn't reporting what. Pretty sure it has to do with leveraging out of sales tax. Seeing an order total is what people think of, and keeps the burden of taxes off their hands. It's more or less a perceived price advantage I guess.

Member

This year long potential conflict between a major video game retailer and a major video game company seems like the sort of thing that would be great to look into if you were some sort of journalist covering video games. It's probably easier to just post Halo screenshots and stories about how many McChickens THQ is worth, though.